AI is making us work more • Hacker News Board

Re: AI is making us work more

#111

Post by dingnuts » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:51 PM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #62

everdrive wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Being adaptable now is more important than ever. I do actually plan on getting old, and as much as I would love to retire before I'm no longer adaptable, I'm not so sure my finances or my brain will comply. >At home I save time because my dishwasher automates washing my dishes. I don't think this fits my analogy, because you personally can go watch TV or read a book or exercise given the time that is saved by the di…

> At work, you must be at work doing something else, and the "something else" is seldom a real improvement. If I could automate my job and then go on a hike I'd be a lot more excited about it. When you find an employer that is happy to pay people to not work, let me know because I also want to work there.

it's called being the employer. if you own the capital and you automate the labor then it's your call what to do with the extra time

Re: AI is making us work more

#112

Post by recursive » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:51 PM UTC

gmadsen wrote: post #107

brendoelfrendo wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For instance, I had to rename a collection of files almost following a pattern. I know that there are apps that do this and normally I’d reach for the Perl-based rename script. But I do it so irregularly that I have to install it every time, figure out how I can do a dry run first, etc. Meanwhile, with the Raycast AI integration that also supports Finder, I did it in the 10-15 seconds that it took to type the promp…

as part of the prompt, have a test suite with test files. Its still fully automated by the LLM but adds confidence

If it's under the umbrella of LLM automation, then I'd also need to verify that the test suite behavior actually matches the "production" behavior.

Re: AI is making us work more

#113

Post by nahuel0x » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:52 PM UTC

throwaway0123_5 wrote: post #81

pmg101 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say you could automate your job and go on a hike. Great! You can have a fun hike. But you wouldn't get paid for that. I think it's broadly reasonable that you would only be paid for doing something someone else needs doing.

I think the problem is if/when AGI enables "someone else" to not need human employees for ~anything. The people that own physical capital (land, farms, mines, etc.) would have robots and GPT-N to extract value from it. The people who survive based on their labor are SOL. I think it is reasonable that many people won't be excited about that kind of automation.

The problem is capitalism, not automation.

Re: AI is making us work more

#114

Post by OptionOfT » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:53 PM UTC

For me, it is making my work miserable.

I'm seeing amount of changes needed to produce new features when coding with these AI tools constantly increasing, due to the absence of a proper foundation, and due to the willingness of people to accept it, with the idea that 'we can change it quickly'.

It has become acceptable to push those changes in a PR and present them as your own, filled with filler comments that are instant tech debt, because they just repeat the code.

And while I actually don't care who writes the code, I do expect the PR author to properly understand the code and most importantly, the impact on the codebase.

In my role as a mentor I now spend a lot of time looking at things written and wonder: Did the author write this, or did they AI? Because if the code is wrong, this question changes how the conversation goes.

It also impacts the kind of energy I'm willing to put in into educating the other person as to how things can be improved.

Re: AI is making us work more

#115

Post by WorldPeas » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:55 PM UTC

SomaticPirate wrote: post #51

elcapithanos wrote: post #25

I did not anticipate this much traffic, working on restoring it right now

Curious about your hosting stack? I'm always curious if a jam stack site can handle these big surges better. Or is this just a single VPS?

Maybe it's hosted on a disposable vape

Re: AI is making us work more

#116

Post by _pdp_ » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:56 PM UTC

I had to post this because it’s a related to OP’s post

https://chatbotkit.com/reflections/why-ai-coding-agents-crea...

The tldr is that AI works like multiplier on both sides of the equation. Not only we will work more but we will get even more stressed because things will be moving at increasing speed - perpetually - until we hit some limit of course .

Re: AI is making us work more

#117

Post by sojournerc » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:57 PM UTC

bravetraveler wrote: post #105

sojournerc wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought the same... Then I got laid off. It can happen, not certain it will happen to you, and delivering quality certainly matters more than loc or stupid metrics. Glad you're in a good situation

You say this as if I've never been laid off before. I have, because of acquisitions and even poor performance after the loss of a family member. My point is this: it's going to happen anyway. I refuse to over-extend [any more] to stave the inevitable. I'm in a good spot because I have a solid network (contacts/skills) and reasonable savings. I'm sure the employer would be mad to know I'm posting right now, I don't ca…

Ok, we're 100% aligning. I was taking care of myself, because I was on the way to bad burnout, and wasn't delivering what I had during the "honeymoon" with that company. Despite feeling like a lynchpin in the organization, I was blindsided by a layoff. Now I'm a professional woodworker and don't give a shit about any of that anymore. Cheers!

Re: AI is making us work more

#118

Post by fragmede » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:59 PM UTC

daymanstep wrote: post #5

dustingetz wrote: post #3

when the bottleneck is communication (coordination costs scale polynomial with number of nodes in the graph), the optimal strategy is to have fewer nodes working harder. If AI makes individual nodes more effective, then in terms of people we’re going to eliminate jobs and concentrate effort. The mean job effort (including the unemployed) may be halftime while the median is 996 and the mode is 0. Whether it works is m…

Could you explain how AI is going to make energy, water, food, and shelter cheaper ?

If you're asking for AI hype, promises that haven't come to pass and may not ever, but proponents want you to believe (I mean, I want to believe, the question is if it's a rational belief or not), I can give you some. AI could lead to scientific advancements and make fusion reactors on Earth feasible. (We have one in the sky already, it's just 1 AU away.) With AI enabling fusion, (because controlling the magnetic fields is beyond what humans can do), we get cheap energy. Cheap energy means electrolysis is feasible, making water cheaper. AI robots to farm the fields means land that was previously uneconomical to farm on becomes usable. More arable land means more crops can be grown. Food is already cheap as hell though, farmers don't make a good living in the global economy. Shelter, unfortunately, is a political problem. We have the technology to build more housing right fucking now. China has a glut of housing. Blame the NIMBYs for your housing cost. But AI, in the form of a machine that fills out the paperwork required to build, faster and cheaper will help. Especially in the case of nuclear power plant permits. AI, in the form of helping to generate architectural models of your home that you get 3d printed is also a thing.

But that's all a bunch of hype that may never come to pass. Some people don't want to hear any hype. Hoping is too much to take if you've been let down too hard before. Or for the rich and you're poor. It's there though, if you want to dream. Dream big.

Re: AI is making us work more

#119

Post by bravetraveler » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 4:59 PM UTC

sojournerc wrote: post #117

bravetraveler wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say this as if I've never been laid off before. I have, because of acquisitions and even poor performance after the loss of a family member. My point is this: it's going to happen anyway. I refuse to over-extend [any more] to stave the inevitable. I'm in a good spot because I have a solid network (contacts/skills) and reasonable savings. I'm sure the employer would be mad to know I'm posting right now, I don't ca…

Ok, we're 100% aligning. I was taking care of myself, because I was on the way to bad burnout, and wasn't delivering what I had during the "honeymoon" with that company. Despite feeling like a lynchpin in the organization, I was blindsided by a layoff. Now I'm a professional woodworker and don't give a shit about any of that anymore. Cheers!

The wood turns on you, but never like that. Cheers indeed! Enjoy and stay safe out there.

Re: AI is making us work more

#120

Post by BeetleB » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 5:00 PM UTC

everdrive wrote: post #37

I was never excited for automation. Automation doesn't mean we do less. It means that we do as much work, and now also the work has a higher complexity ceiling; you need to understand the systems that are being automated, and need to maintain the automation. More things are possible, but everything is more complex, and of course, you still need to work 40 hours a week. Products don't get better either, but that's mor…

My first engineering job was non-SW, and had a lot of manual work. I automated a lot of it.

Yes, it led to more work. What would take half a day could now be done in an hour. So we now had to produce 4x more.

I spent 4 years there automating left and right. Everyone silently hated me. One of the problems with my automation was that it allowed for more and more Q/A. And the more you check for quality issues, the more issues you'll find. Suddenly we needed to achieve 4x more, and that meant finding 4x more problems. The thing about automation is that it doesn't speed up debugging time. This leads to more stress.

One senior guy took me aside and said management would not reward me for my efforts, but will get the benefit of all my work.

He was right.

Eventually, I left because I automate things to make my life easier. If it's not making my life easier (or getting me more money), why should I do it?

Since then, whenever I get a new job, I test the waters. If the outcome is like that first job, I stop working on process improvements, and look for another job.